"Father Haskell" wrote in message
...
On Aug 21, 9:46 pm, "symplastless" wrote:
Good question Father Haskell.

Father Haskell please beware that butchers are highly skilled people. To
call someone a butcher that mutilates a tree is incorrect. You could
graft something but it would not be a branch. At the most it would be is
a sprout. Branches are attached to a tree by many years of trunk and
branch collars. The pith of a branch almost touches the pith of the
parent stem. If you grafted something, if, the most it would be is
attached to the outer most portion of the trunk. Branches do not
regenerate, they generate. A good book on branches and how they are
attached to trees is TREE PRUNING, A WORLDWIDE PHOTO GUIDE
atwww.shigoandtrees.com . You cannot graft a branch. I do not care the
size of the tree or how old the tree is. You just cannot graft something
to the outer most part of the tree trunk and expect it to be connected to
the core of the trunk like a branch. If trees were healing organisms and
parts inside the tree would regenerate than it might be possible. Trees
and parts do not regenerate they generate. As far as the tree goes I
would have to see the tree to make some recommendations on how to increase
the aesthetics. Safety and health would be first concerns and then
aesthetics.
Again, the age and size of the tree is not in the slightest bit the
limiting factor to your idea. The factor is that trees generate and do
not regenerate. We can put roots (non-woody to start) just about any
place on the tree. That is why improper mulching, mulch against the trunk
flare, is so injurious. The darkness and moisture of the mulch will
stimulate parenchyma cells to divide and differentiate to form non-woody
roots. Then the first dry spell the roots die. Roots do not grow from
buds they grow from meristematic points. When the roots die in that way
the abscission zone does not form sealing the entrance of pathogens into
the tree. Anyway a branch, to be a branch, must start its growth very
close to the pith of the parent stem. Size and age of tree has absolutely
nothing to do with the reason why you cannot graft a branch where a sprout
would otherwise form.
Page 22 and 23 of the World Wide Photo Guide shows what I mean.
alsohttp://www.treedictionary.com/DICT2003/tree_pruning/targets/symplastl...

http://www.treedictionary.com/DICT20...gets/symplastl...
shows you how the branch core goes close to pith. There is a hardened
area at the base of the branch pit called the Pith Protection Zone, also
referred to as the Pith Plug, so a organism or microorganism cannot not
move freely in tree. Its
hehttp://www.treedictionary.com/DICT20...tion_zone.html

Again this is an excellent question.

And Staples calls me the fraud?

--
Sincerely,
John A. Keslick, Jr.
Consulting Tree Biologisthttp://home.ccil.org/~treeman
and www.treedictionary.com
Beware of so-called tree experts who do not understand tree biology.
Storms, fires, floods, earthquakes, and volcanic eruptions keep reminding
us that we are not the boss.
Some people will buy products they do not understand and not buy books
that will give them understanding.

Any further questions can be addressed to

"Father Haskell" wrote in
...
Girlfriend's mom has a beautiful 50 year old red maple which was
mutilated by an ignorant "tree surgeon." A lower branch was
reduced to stubs after said tree butcher decided the branch got
in people's way; apparently, stooping or simply walking around
the offending branch was too difficult. The tree is disfigured,
removed of the graceful, Japanese form provided by the lower
growth. No meristem or buds were left to regenerate into new
branches. All wounds are distant from branch collars, and will
likely rot unless corrected.

Can the tree be restored by taking a few branches from high
up, where they won't be missed, and grafting them into the
stubs?

Plan would be to end graft. Cut back a stub to still-green
cambium, split it, and wedge in a couple of slips, being careful
to maintain contact between cambium layers. Tie and
seal as recommended. A year from now, cut out the weaker
of the two slips and let the stronger one continue as the new
leader. Branches are not being grafted into trunks -- into which
I'd first have to graft collars -- they are being grafted into other
branches, to xylem and phloem. No different, really, from
how apple trees are grafted onto crab rootstocks, as when
dwarfing them.

Wow! Ok, you already have the branch core from an existing branch which is
now a stub. You are trying to graft part of another branch to the branch
core out on the stub. That makes some sense. What is your window until
xylem takes on lignin and becomes sapwood? Most growth in girth on most
trees is complete in (I think) in 6-8 weeks after the leaves have fully
formed. I would think that the xylem is now sapwood and not xylem. Please
keep me informed as to your success. You would have to wait until next year
for the new xylem to form, right? You may have some meristematic points in
your stub. You can do things to red maple that you cannot do to other
maples. I guess the goal would be keep the cambium zone alive in the stub
so it produces xylem next year to graft to. Are we on the same page?


--
Sincerely,
John A. Keslick, Jr.
Consulting Tree Biologist
http://home.ccil.org/~treeman
and www.treedictionary.com
Beware of so-called tree experts who do not understand tree biology.
Storms, fires, floods, earthquakes, and volcanic eruptions keep reminding us
that we are not the boss.
Some people will buy products they do not understand and not buy books that
will give them understanding.